It is if you're the teacher, and you need to have a certain percentage of students pass or you could lose your job. All you need to do that job is ignorance and confidence, don't think or you'll commit suicide at how hopeless it is.
It's a self-selection process. Those special snowflakes are the next generation of follow-the-instructions-exactly fast food cooks. They're as good as robots - it wouldn't occur to either to try to find a better way and they just follow the program.
That's the point.
Teach logic to preschoolers, I say.
Good luck with that. There are kids in their 20s in college who can't budget, can't cook, and if it isn't on Facebook it doesn't exist. There are adults high school (drop-outs) who have never applied for even a part-time job and as a result are too afraid of rejection to give it a try (real special snowflakes) They drop out of government-paid trade schools that give them an extra stipend, and they can't budget either, which is why they get iPhones and home internet on a $150 a month plan as soon as their check comes, go to concerts at $200 a pop, eat out with their friends, and then wonder why they have no money for food or rent.
You don't need to teach them critical thinking - you need to teach them basic thinking. Cause and effect, such as "you spend money on sh*t you want, you won't have money for sh*t you need.".
Last week I had the displeasure to watch one second-year college student who works as a cook in a burger franchise screw up making grilled cheese.
Q: How the hell do you screw up making a grilled cheese sandwich?
They don't have basic life skills and you expect to teach them logic? Sheldon says (and Mr Spock agrees) that is illogical. And we have a new generation of teachers who don't know much either, because they were also special snowflakes. They teach from the book because, like the burger cook, they can't do it if it isn't laid out step by step.
"an accident just before landing" - sounds like it either hit a power line or some other obstacle - or a bird took it out. If they can take down big airlines, what chance does a drone have?
Or maybe because they kept it up 3x as long as it was designed, something let go that wouldn't have on a shorter flight. We just don't know, and the article doesn't say.
Was the flight a success? Sure - it exceeded it's planned mission goals. Not bad for a drone with a 130' wingspan. And it also found a possible design or operations flaw - that's what test flights are for.
Go read Bush's pardon of Caspar Weinberger and 5 others in the Iran-Conta affair doesn't mention any specific crimes. "Complete and unconditional pardon [list of people pardoned]. for all offenses charged or prosecuted... or committed..." - that's blanket coverage of anything and everything they did in connection with their jobs, not just Iran-Contra.
NOW, THEREFORE, I, GEORGE BUSH, President of the United States of America, pursuant to my powers under Article II, Section 2, of the Constitution, do hereby grant a full, complete and unconditional pardon to Elliott Abrams, Duane R. Clarridge, Alan Fiers, Clair George, Robert C. McFarlane, and Caspar W. Weinberger for all offenses charged or prosecuted by independent counsel Lawrence E. Walsh or other members of his office, or committed by these individuals and within the jurisdiction of that office.
That's a blanket pardon. Same as Nixon's.
Now, THEREFORE, I, GERALD R. FORD, President of the United States, pursuant to the pardon power conferred upon me by Article II, Section 2, of the Constitution, have granted and by these presents do grant a full, free, and absolute pardon unto Richard Nixon for all offenses against the United States which he, Richard Nixon, has committed or may have committed or taken part in during the period from January 20, 1969 through August 9, 1974.
Neither one sets out what specific offenses were committed.
We know who Snowden met, and it wasn't with Russians. Putin lets him live in Russia to embarrass the US - and it's working. Same as he knew that he could take over the Crimea during the Sochi olympics and not a single government would pull their teams mid-way through. He's playing chess while the US is trying to play poker, using one "red line in the sand" after another.
Putin doesn't even have to try to get information out of him. He can access Wikileaks just fine. Or he can just break into the Chinese networks when they have hacked into US networks and get what he wants on both countries.
Only if you're making a list of the top 100 presidents.
BTW, Clinton didn't win a majority of the votes either. The rules of the game were clear - you had to win electoral votes, not the popular vote. Otherwise the campaign would have been centered on the largest urban areas and everyone else ignored. Hence the electoral college - to make sure that doesn't happen.
Sanders would have won. Warren would have won - and probably will in 2020. It took Clinton to get Trump elected.
For those who don't believe tha above poster's claim of murder, search for "Obama Kill List", which will lead you to the "Disposition Matrix" - a list of people who the government says can be killed without due process, and the fact of the matter is that collateral damage is something they anticipated by having a fund to pay for the relatives of the innocents killed.
Even the old KGB was more discrete, more surgical, more professional. Collateral killings are fuel for terrorist recruitment efforts.
When someone is posting absolute shit lies that are what the administration wants you to believe, they ARE sucking government cock. Or taking it up the ass. Or both. Or just trolling, in which case they're useful idiots for the government,
The are no "two sides" on the question of who he turned the stuff over to. He turned it over to reporters. Now if they had some proof that Der Speigel, The Guardian, The New Your Times and The Washington Post are really Russian fronts, that would be different, but nobody has even alleged that.
And stop putting words in my mouth. The only thing I referred to in the gp comment was that the comment I was referring to had claimed that Snowden had exposed state secrets to Russia. Never happened. By the time that Russia found out, they were no longer secrets - they were plastered all over the news.
And Obama has demonstrated time and again that he is no better with the truth than George Bush. When you make arguments about the definition of "can't", you sound like Clinton arguing about the definition of "is" and "sex." Both were attempts to hide the truth.
Whistle-blowers need legal protection. That includes Chelsea Manning. Someone who tries to commit suicide twice should not be punished with solitary confinement. When you have someone in custody, you are responsible to look after their health - physical and mental. Same as if you had custody of a child, or a dog. Solitary just risks further negatively impacting their mental health. There's no question that it's cruel. Is it unusual? It should be. Unfortunately the prison system is full of the mentally ill who are in analogous situations.
We don't punish someone for having cancer or a heart attack or being deaf or blind, but the mentally ill are seen as fair game.
Nobody has successfully challenged that particular clause. It's unambiguous. Both the intent and how it works are clear. But feel free to challenge the pardons that were issued under the last few administrations since the principals are still alive (mostly).
You should stop sucking government-issue cock. He didn't give a single state secret to Russia. To the contrary, they were given to a consortium of news agencies, who then vetted every one to ensure that no names of any operatives were exposed, no field agents were put in danger.
But of course, blame the messenger when you don't like the message. When the government breaks the law, it should be exposed. That's why we make the distinction between law-abiding governments and lawless regimes.
Congress didn't make him renege on his promise to have the most transparent administration ever.
Congress didn't force him to pass the ACA, enriching the insurance industry.
Here's one - a whopper of a lie to the working poor:
"Will further raise the minimum wage to $9.50 an hour by 2011, index it to inflation and increase the Earned Income Tax Credit to make sure that full-time workers can earn a living wage that allows them to raise their families and pay for basic needs such as food, transportation, and housing."
5 years after it was supposed to be raised to $9.60 an hour, it's still $7,25.
And then there's this lie directed at environmentalists:
"Half of all cars purchased by the federal government will be plug-in hybrids or all-electric by 2012."
And this one:
"I can make a firm pledge. Under my plan, no family making less than $250,000 a year will see any form of tax increase. Not your income tax, not your payroll tax, not your capital gains taxes, not any of your taxes."
Obama has used more signing statements than any other president. Totally puts the lie to this promise:
"While it is legitimate for a president to issue a signing statement to clarify his understanding of ambiguous provisions of statutes and to explain his view of how he intends to faithfully execute the law, it is a clear abuse of power to use such statements as a license to evade laws that the president does not like or as an end-run around provisions designed to foster accountability. I will not use signing statements to nullify or undermine congressional instructions as enacted into law."
The power of a president to grant a pardon is only limited by not being able to pardon in cases of impeachment.
The President shall be Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the Militia of the several States, when called into the actual Service of the United States; he may require the Opinion, in writing, of the principal Officer in each of the executive Departments, upon any Subject relating to the Duties of their respective Offices, and he shall have Power to grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offenses against the United States, except in Cases of Impeachment.
Seems pretty straight-forward.
1 Snowden is alleged to have committed offences against the United States.
2. He is not being impeached.
3. Obama is president.
4. He can grant a reprieve or pardon according to the above-cited Constitution, Article 2, Section 2, Clause 1.
Congress cannot ignore the pardon. Snowden is free to testify and admit every damn thing, and there's nothing they can do about it, since it would have been pardoned. He probably would, because it would give him a platform and a chance to get all the crap into the congressional record. Congress does NOT want that. They would shit their collective pants.
Obama is just phoning it in nowadays. What started off so well 8 years ago ("Hope and Yes we can" in 2008) has morphed into "hopeless" and "no we can't."
Like the promise for the most open administration ever, and giving the insurance companies the ACA - the gift that keeps on giving. Even a year ago I would have said that Obama would go down in history as one of the best presidents. Was I ever wrong.
So they sit on their asses instead of getting real evidence? You know, stuff like investigating to discover the means, motive, and opportunity, witnesses, whether the person has an alibi and whether it checks out, as well as any physical evidence. Stuff that forensics can analyse, fingerprints, the crime scene, the victim. Basic stuff that you need to produce a compelling case.
By the same token, ubiquitous CCTV cameras should reduce crime. Too bad that the experience in Britain showed that all it did was divert cops from having a street presence. Kind of hard to be afraid of some donut-eater telling you to stop over a speaker under a camera.
The vast number of android phones sold were from someone other than google, so there's no incentive. Same as the manufacturers have no incentive to make a removable battery. That would hurt their sales. Ditto for software upgrades. Ditto for making it easy for you to get root.
Microsoft and Apple can sell stuff in their own stores because they make money on the OS. Google gives it away. Again, no money there.
And their premise is stupidly wrong
A retail presence is something that’s been key to building a premium mobile device customer base that’s sizable and loyal,
Hint - android itself is not seen as a "premium OS" and never will be. Most people's loyalty is based on cheaper, not the google brand As sizable, you managed to make it to a 90% market share without stores, so there's not much headroom for expansion anyway.
Sounds like a brain fart from someone who had to either find a new project or be out of a job, and everyone around them saluted when it was ru up the flag pole because they're in the same boat.
Strange how police were able to solve crime before cell phones were invented, but now can't do anything but sit at a computer. Legwork and evidence and deduction seem to be too "old school" for them.
Last time I looked, since my birth cert didn't always say female, so I guess so:-)
Clearly the whole transgender hate thing can be fixed by the individual states issuing properly corrected birth certificates. There is NO way that federal legislation can do that, nor offer the same protections. All those stupid bathroom bills disappear when you have a new (not amended) birth certificate with your new sex.
We've had laws in this province protecting us from discrimination based on sex, which has been interpreted to include birth sex, for decades. Other provinces have been slower catching up, but it's getting there.
Same thing with birth certificates. Some provinces destroy your old birth certificate, any marriage or divorce records, and your kids birth certificates and issue new ones with the new name and sex; these are recognized by all levels of government as the only ones with legal standing. Makes my marriage 40 years ago the world's first government-recognized same sex marriage, since I only got to finish all the paperwork after the newest laws kicked in (long story) . Gotta love retroactivity.
How is a school going to bar a trans girl using the same bathroom as other girls if she's legally a girl, and the old records, even if produced, have no legal standing? Simple answer - they can't. So while I agree with Obama that Title IX "should" apply to such cases, there's no way to get the states to accept it without the cooperation of the two houses. Trying to impose it by executive writ wouldn't be a lasting protection anyway, so nothing of value was lost. Just that EVERY F*ING TRANS IN THE US IS FREAKING OUT FOR NO REASON.
Bunch of bloody drama queens, reposting every rumour and speculation. No wonder 35% are dysfunctional according to their own doctors. It's the same with both sides on pretty much all the issues, because nobody knows yet how it's going to unfurl.
As one example, non-NATO-member allies Japan and South Korea have been reassured that the US has their back, while at the same time saying that they really do need to kick in more for their defense. That's a far cry from the isolationism rhetoric of the election. It's something both parties would have liked to be able to do.
Not going to like a lot of things he does, but it's worth the risk to see if he can get some sort of rapprochement with Putin so that there's less risk of everyone glowing in the dark or turning into radioactive zombies. Same as Nixon, being so anti-communist, was the only politician who could have credibly gotten better relations with them and made it stick.
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It is if you're the teacher, and you need to have a certain percentage of students pass or you could lose your job. All you need to do that job is ignorance and confidence, don't think or you'll commit suicide at how hopeless it is.
It's a self-selection process. Those special snowflakes are the next generation of follow-the-instructions-exactly fast food cooks. They're as good as robots - it wouldn't occur to either to try to find a better way and they just follow the program.
That's the point. Teach logic to preschoolers, I say.
Good luck with that. There are kids in their 20s in college who can't budget, can't cook, and if it isn't on Facebook it doesn't exist. There are adults high school (drop-outs) who have never applied for even a part-time job and as a result are too afraid of rejection to give it a try (real special snowflakes) They drop out of government-paid trade schools that give them an extra stipend, and they can't budget either, which is why they get iPhones and home internet on a $150 a month plan as soon as their check comes, go to concerts at $200 a pop, eat out with their friends, and then wonder why they have no money for food or rent.
You don't need to teach them critical thinking - you need to teach them basic thinking. Cause and effect, such as "you spend money on sh*t you want, you won't have money for sh*t you need.".
Last week I had the displeasure to watch one second-year college student who works as a cook in a burger franchise screw up making grilled cheese.
Q: How the hell do you screw up making a grilled cheese sandwich?
They don't have basic life skills and you expect to teach them logic? Sheldon says (and Mr Spock agrees) that is illogical. And we have a new generation of teachers who don't know much either, because they were also special snowflakes. They teach from the book because, like the burger cook, they can't do it if it isn't laid out step by step.
Or maybe because they kept it up 3x as long as it was designed, something let go that wouldn't have on a shorter flight. We just don't know, and the article doesn't say.
Was the flight a success? Sure - it exceeded it's planned mission goals. Not bad for a drone with a 130' wingspan. And it also found a possible design or operations flaw - that's what test flights are for.
Go read Bush's pardon of Caspar Weinberger and 5 others in the Iran-Conta affair doesn't mention any specific crimes. "Complete and unconditional pardon [list of people pardoned]. for all offenses charged or prosecuted ... or committed ..." - that's blanket coverage of anything and everything they did in connection with their jobs, not just Iran-Contra.
NOW, THEREFORE, I, GEORGE BUSH, President of the United States of America, pursuant to my powers under Article II, Section 2, of the Constitution, do hereby grant a full, complete and unconditional pardon to Elliott Abrams, Duane R. Clarridge, Alan Fiers, Clair George, Robert C. McFarlane, and Caspar W. Weinberger for all offenses charged or prosecuted by independent counsel Lawrence E. Walsh or other members of his office, or committed by these individuals and within the jurisdiction of that office.
That's a blanket pardon. Same as Nixon's.
Now, THEREFORE, I, GERALD R. FORD, President of the United States, pursuant to the pardon power conferred upon me by Article II, Section 2, of the Constitution, have granted and by these presents do grant a full, free, and absolute pardon unto Richard Nixon for all offenses against the United States which he, Richard Nixon, has committed or may have committed or taken part in during the period from January 20, 1969 through August 9, 1974.
Neither one sets out what specific offenses were committed.
We know who Snowden met, and it wasn't with Russians. Putin lets him live in Russia to embarrass the US - and it's working. Same as he knew that he could take over the Crimea during the Sochi olympics and not a single government would pull their teams mid-way through. He's playing chess while the US is trying to play poker, using one "red line in the sand" after another.
Putin doesn't even have to try to get information out of him. He can access Wikileaks just fine. Or he can just break into the Chinese networks when they have hacked into US networks and get what he wants on both countries.
Only if you're making a list of the top 100 presidents.
BTW, Clinton didn't win a majority of the votes either. The rules of the game were clear - you had to win electoral votes, not the popular vote. Otherwise the campaign would have been centered on the largest urban areas and everyone else ignored. Hence the electoral college - to make sure that doesn't happen.
Sanders would have won. Warren would have won - and probably will in 2020. It took Clinton to get Trump elected.
For those who don't believe tha above poster's claim of murder, search for "Obama Kill List", which will lead you to the "Disposition Matrix" - a list of people who the government says can be killed without due process, and the fact of the matter is that collateral damage is something they anticipated by having a fund to pay for the relatives of the innocents killed.
Even the old KGB was more discrete, more surgical, more professional. Collateral killings are fuel for terrorist recruitment efforts.
When someone is posting absolute shit lies that are what the administration wants you to believe, they ARE sucking government cock. Or taking it up the ass. Or both. Or just trolling, in which case they're useful idiots for the government,
The are no "two sides" on the question of who he turned the stuff over to. He turned it over to reporters. Now if they had some proof that Der Speigel, The Guardian, The New Your Times and The Washington Post are really Russian fronts, that would be different, but nobody has even alleged that.
And stop putting words in my mouth. The only thing I referred to in the gp comment was that the comment I was referring to had claimed that Snowden had exposed state secrets to Russia. Never happened. By the time that Russia found out, they were no longer secrets - they were plastered all over the news.
And Obama has demonstrated time and again that he is no better with the truth than George Bush. When you make arguments about the definition of "can't", you sound like Clinton arguing about the definition of "is" and "sex." Both were attempts to hide the truth.
Whistle-blowers need legal protection. That includes Chelsea Manning. Someone who tries to commit suicide twice should not be punished with solitary confinement. When you have someone in custody, you are responsible to look after their health - physical and mental. Same as if you had custody of a child, or a dog. Solitary just risks further negatively impacting their mental health. There's no question that it's cruel. Is it unusual? It should be. Unfortunately the prison system is full of the mentally ill who are in analogous situations.
We don't punish someone for having cancer or a heart attack or being deaf or blind, but the mentally ill are seen as fair game.
Nobody has successfully challenged that particular clause. It's unambiguous. Both the intent and how it works are clear. But feel free to challenge the pardons that were issued under the last few administrations since the principals are still alive (mostly).
You should stop sucking government-issue cock. He didn't give a single state secret to Russia. To the contrary, they were given to a consortium of news agencies, who then vetted every one to ensure that no names of any operatives were exposed, no field agents were put in danger.
But of course, blame the messenger when you don't like the message. When the government breaks the law, it should be exposed. That's why we make the distinction between law-abiding governments and lawless regimes.
Congress didn't make him renege on his promise to have the most transparent administration ever.
Congress didn't force him to pass the ACA, enriching the insurance industry.
Here's one - a whopper of a lie to the working poor:
"Will further raise the minimum wage to $9.50 an hour by 2011, index it to inflation and increase the Earned Income Tax Credit to make sure that full-time workers can earn a living wage that allows them to raise their families and pay for basic needs such as food, transportation, and housing."
5 years after it was supposed to be raised to $9.60 an hour, it's still $7,25.
And then there's this lie directed at environmentalists:
"Half of all cars purchased by the federal government will be plug-in hybrids or all-electric by 2012."
And this one:
"I can make a firm pledge. Under my plan, no family making less than $250,000 a year will see any form of tax increase. Not your income tax, not your payroll tax, not your capital gains taxes, not any of your taxes."
Obama has used more signing statements than any other president. Totally puts the lie to this promise:
"While it is legitimate for a president to issue a signing statement to clarify his understanding of ambiguous provisions of statutes and to explain his view of how he intends to faithfully execute the law, it is a clear abuse of power to use such statements as a license to evade laws that the president does not like or as an end-run around provisions designed to foster accountability. I will not use signing statements to nullify or undermine congressional instructions as enacted into law."
There's more. Lots more.
The power of a president to grant a pardon is only limited by not being able to pardon in cases of impeachment.
The President shall be Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the Militia of the several States, when called into the actual Service of the United States; he may require the Opinion, in writing, of the principal Officer in each of the executive Departments, upon any Subject relating to the Duties of their respective Offices, and he shall have Power to grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offenses against the United States, except in Cases of Impeachment.
Seems pretty straight-forward.
1 Snowden is alleged to have committed offences against the United States.
2. He is not being impeached.
3. Obama is president.
4. He can grant a reprieve or pardon according to the above-cited Constitution, Article 2, Section 2, Clause 1.
Congress cannot ignore the pardon. Snowden is free to testify and admit every damn thing, and there's nothing they can do about it, since it would have been pardoned. He probably would, because it would give him a platform and a chance to get all the crap into the congressional record. Congress does NOT want that. They would shit their collective pants.
Obama is just phoning it in nowadays. What started off so well 8 years ago ("Hope and Yes we can" in 2008) has morphed into "hopeless" and "no we can't."
Like the promise for the most open administration ever, and giving the insurance companies the ACA - the gift that keeps on giving. Even a year ago I would have said that Obama would go down in history as one of the best presidents. Was I ever wrong.
And they already have plenty of others selling stuff for them. Why bother with unnecessary overhead AND piss off your partners?
So they sit on their asses instead of getting real evidence? You know, stuff like investigating to discover the means, motive, and opportunity, witnesses, whether the person has an alibi and whether it checks out, as well as any physical evidence. Stuff that forensics can analyse, fingerprints, the crime scene, the victim. Basic stuff that you need to produce a compelling case.
And yet there was nothing on the phone that they wanted Apple to decrypt that was the center of a huge debate and lots of posturing.
By the same token, ubiquitous CCTV cameras should reduce crime. Too bad that the experience in Britain showed that all it did was divert cops from having a street presence. Kind of hard to be afraid of some donut-eater telling you to stop over a speaker under a camera.
The vast number of android phones sold were from someone other than google, so there's no incentive. Same as the manufacturers have no incentive to make a removable battery. That would hurt their sales. Ditto for software upgrades. Ditto for making it easy for you to get root.
Microsoft and Apple can sell stuff in their own stores because they make money on the OS. Google gives it away. Again, no money there.
And their premise is stupidly wrong
A retail presence is something that’s been key to building a premium mobile device customer base that’s sizable and loyal,
Hint - android itself is not seen as a "premium OS" and never will be. Most people's loyalty is based on cheaper, not the google brand As sizable, you managed to make it to a 90% market share without stores, so there's not much headroom for expansion anyway.
Sounds like a brain fart from someone who had to either find a new project or be out of a job, and everyone around them saluted when it was ru up the flag pole because they're in the same boat.
Nah, if you need help they're programmed to tell you to just f*cking google it. Or RTFM.
Strange how police were able to solve crime before cell phones were invented, but now can't do anything but sit at a computer. Legwork and evidence and deduction seem to be too "old school" for them.
Barbera, aren't you a Canadian transgender?
Last time I looked, since my birth cert didn't always say female, so I guess so :-)
Clearly the whole transgender hate thing can be fixed by the individual states issuing properly corrected birth certificates. There is NO way that federal legislation can do that, nor offer the same protections. All those stupid bathroom bills disappear when you have a new (not amended) birth certificate with your new sex.
We've had laws in this province protecting us from discrimination based on sex, which has been interpreted to include birth sex, for decades. Other provinces have been slower catching up, but it's getting there.
Same thing with birth certificates. Some provinces destroy your old birth certificate, any marriage or divorce records, and your kids birth certificates and issue new ones with the new name and sex; these are recognized by all levels of government as the only ones with legal standing. Makes my marriage 40 years ago the world's first government-recognized same sex marriage, since I only got to finish all the paperwork after the newest laws kicked in (long story) . Gotta love retroactivity.
How is a school going to bar a trans girl using the same bathroom as other girls if she's legally a girl, and the old records, even if produced, have no legal standing? Simple answer - they can't. So while I agree with Obama that Title IX "should" apply to such cases, there's no way to get the states to accept it without the cooperation of the two houses. Trying to impose it by executive writ wouldn't be a lasting protection anyway, so nothing of value was lost. Just that EVERY F*ING TRANS IN THE US IS FREAKING OUT FOR NO REASON.
Bunch of bloody drama queens, reposting every rumour and speculation. No wonder 35% are dysfunctional according to their own doctors. It's the same with both sides on pretty much all the issues, because nobody knows yet how it's going to unfurl.
As one example, non-NATO-member allies Japan and South Korea have been reassured that the US has their back, while at the same time saying that they really do need to kick in more for their defense. That's a far cry from the isolationism rhetoric of the election. It's something both parties would have liked to be able to do.
Not going to like a lot of things he does, but it's worth the risk to see if he can get some sort of rapprochement with Putin so that there's less risk of everyone glowing in the dark or turning into radioactive zombies. Same as Nixon, being so anti-communist, was the only politician who could have credibly gotten better relations with them and made it stick.
Not me. Negative campaigns have always caused me to vote "weirdly." Like last election, when I voted Green.
Why not? You're taking your cues from a reality TV star.
Not me. Both parties are cats in mouseland.